


apple cider

by pyoilu



Category: Block B
Genre: Alternate Universe, Binge Drinking, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-08
Updated: 2016-06-08
Packaged: 2018-07-13 01:47:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,065
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7133576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pyoilu/pseuds/pyoilu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>drunk messy sad boys AU</p>
            </blockquote>





	apple cider

**Author's Note:**

> it's not mentioned and probably not very important, but they're rich too.

 

Taeil was sitting across him, his elbows on the table and the cuffs of his suit jacket falling down to his wrists. Color all over his hands, beer on his breath; he was a mess. He kept saying he was depressed, totally and completely depressed, because Yukwon had left with Minhyuk and hadn't bothered to tell Taeil that they weren't dating anymore, had only let it fade away like a week long fling and maybe that was all it had been, but Jihoon was starting to think Taeil really liked Yukwon. Or maybe he was just drunk.

 

'It's not, like, the end of the world,' Jihoon said carefully. He didn't know why he was being careful. Taeil was too drunk to pay even half attention to him. 'You'll be fine, hyung. There's, like, hundreds of people in the world, right? You just gotta find one.'

 

Taeil tipped his head back with his eyes closed and was muttering about the music being utter shit, then he let his head fall forward and laid it softly on the table and started making this really low whining noise like he was going to absolutely _die_ and it was kind of unnerving, a little funny; Jihoon didn't want to laugh though. It felt rude to.

 

So he took Taeil's arm and put it over his shoulder and paid the tab with the card in Taeil's wallet and hailed a cab and took him home, all the way up the three flights of stairs because the lift was broken—again—and into the cold dark of Taeil's apartment. Jihoon thought: no wonder he was depressed. The walls were bare and the bar was half empty and the terrace was all cluttered in old lawn furniture from the house Taeil used to live in with his parents before they split for Paris, and everything was so disheveled it was hard to look at.

 

'Why do you live like this?,' Jihoon muttered to Taeil's temple, but Taeil didn't say anything. He was too drunk. Too out of it. He leaned his head back and put his sweaty forehead to the side of Jihoon's face and said something that sounded like, _stay the night with me_ , so Jihoon shrugged and dropped Taeil on the couch before turning on the TV. There was no way he was gonna sleep in the bed. Not tonight, anyway.

 

*

 

Come morning and he was alone. There was a note on the side table and an ache in his head that reminded him of the vodka he'd had the night before. Tiny script, messy and hard to read. Jihoon thought it said, _thanks for taking me home_ , but he might have made that up.

 

He left after a cup of coffee, piece of toast between his teeth and the spare key Taeil left him clasped to his damp palm. August. It was hot. Everything sweaty and murky like dirty water; he tried to hail a cab home but none would stop. He imagined it was because of his undone tie and his open shirt, dirty hair; he looked poor, felt poor, but had a good wad of cash in his pocket. Whatever. He could walk.

 

Once home he called Taeil but there wasn't an answer, so he called Yukwon and got his voicemail. He left a message asking why Yukwon had left the night before with Minhyuk and why he'd left Taeil alone at the bar, but Jihoon knew he wouldn't get a call back. But he hadn't realized until after he'd sent the message. So he called Jiho and asked if Yukwon had been around that morning, but Jiho grumbled tiredly that he hadn't seen Yukwon in over two weeks.

 

That was when Jihoon remembered they'd dated a couple months back in the spring, before Yukwon had left Jiho for Taeil and it had all been a giant mess, not hard to remember but easily forgotten all the same.

 

*

 

Two days later, three beers in his system, sitting on Taeil's couch watching Miami Vice with the volume turned so loud it was hard to think over. Jihoon watched, fascinated, as Taeil gnawed on his thumbnail for five minutes straight. It was a wonder he even had a thumb anymore.

 

'Hyung, stop,' and he reached over and pushed Taeil's hand away from his mouth. 'You'll make yourself bleed that way.'

 

Taeil slouched down into the couch then, his arms crossed over his chest, looking like some spurned child who'd just been chewed out and it was kind of cute. Jihoon smiled.

 

'Wanna go out tonight?' he asked.

 

Taeil looked over, his eyes glossy and tired and said, 'Sure,' but they never ended up leaving the couch. They watched close to five episodes of Miami Vice, bullets ricocheting off cars, off people, glass breaking, really harsh sounds that resounded so loudly Jihoon was sure his head was going to split, but five beers into the night and his hearing went numb.

 

He laid his head in Taeil's lap and let Taeil play with his hair, pushing it out of his eyes and behind his ears, blunt chewed up nails soft against his scalp. It was comforting. Really lovely. Jihoon ended up taking Taeil's hand after some time and holding it tightly in his own, and he wasn't sure why he'd done it, but he liked it and so held Taeil's hand the whole night.

 

*

 

Yukwon was wearing a sweater that was too short for his torso and every time he lifted his arms his tummy would flash and it was really toned and pretty, his skin colored deeply by the bar lights and the stage lights and he'd spin on the dance floor with Minhyuk's hand inching up under his sweater, looking handsome and dreamy. It sent a splinter of jealousy right through the center of Jihoon's head so embarrassing he had to look away and look at Taeil who was facing the beer signs over the bar tabs, talking about Shock Top and Undercover and Blue Moon, a bunch of shit Jihoon didn't care about. But the lights looked pretty reflecting off his glasses, like stars sparkling in his eyes; Jihoon sighed.

 

'What is it?,' Taeil asked, taking a pull from his beer.

 

Jihoon shrugged and finished his own drink: a gin and tonic made too strong, but it tasted just fine. He ordered another, feeling warm all over. And it was some time after his third drink that he realized he'd been staring at Taeil's mouth the whole night, and how Taeil kept biting at his lips, licking at them, making them puffy and red. Jihoon wanted to bite at them too, make them even redder.

 

Taeil caught him staring a couple times, but only smiled. His cheeks were dusty pink and his eyes were tired and drunk; his shoulders swaying to the music but the music wasn't any good. It was just because he was drunk.

 

Jihoon touched the back of Taeil's wrist and said, 'Can't we go back to your place?'

 

'Didn't we just get here?'

 

Jihoon shook his head. 'No. I dunno.' He ordered another drink, then watched—a little stunned—as Yukwon pulled Minhyuk by the hand over to the bar.

 

Yukwon leaned over Taeil's shoulder and whispered something that made Taeil smile. Jihoon didn't like it, so he stared at the bubbles in his glass instead. They popped slowly. He counted them, and waited for Yukwon to go back to the floor, but he never did. He stayed the whole time, squished right between Taeil's shoulder and Minhyuk's, drinking seltzer's and club sodas, laughing at things Jihoon couldn't hear over the music—or maybe he just didn't want to hear.

 

Midnight. Maybe 2AM. Jihoon stumbled out of the bar with his hands in his pockets, fingers twitching tiredly about the width of his phone. He'd take the subway; the cabs seemed dangerous when his head was spinning so wildly. Maybe he'd just walk.

 

He managed to get somewhere downtown. He saw the laundry mat and the bank he used to work at before he'd quit for the TELECOM job uptown. And standing by the bank entrance, his forehead on the glass door, looking inside and trying to remember how it'd felt to work there—waking at 6 in the morning, walking to the train, walking to work, eating lunch alone in the park on winter afternoons that were raw and cold and awfully miserable—but it was harder to remember how bad it'd all felt working there now that he didn't anymore. He wondered if he'd made up his misery in the end.

 

That was when a small hand pushed into his pocket, fingers grabbing his own, someone standing behind him. Jihoon would have jumped had he not been so fucking wasted.

 

'You look like you're gonna rob the place.'

 

Jihoon rolled his head on the glass until his cheek was pressed to it, sweaty residue where his forehead had been; he stared right at Taeil who was looking back, tired and grumpy like he'd gone so far out of his way to find Jihoon.

 

'Maybe I am,' Jihoon said defiantly.

 

Taeil smiled then. 'Right. Let's do it tomorrow. I'm tired.'

 

With a nod Jihoon let Taeil pull him off the glass and to the subway underpass, down the stairs, their fingers laced together the whole walk to the train and even then as they sat in the last cart away from the other drunks and the homeless and the teens with the purple circles beneath their eyes, their hands stayed entwined. Taeil felt so small then: tucked in Jihoon's side with his head leaned to his shoulder, hair smelling of lilacs of something more masculine and smokey.

 

It wasn't until they were in the cold comfort of Taeil's cluttered apartment that Jihoon had the guts to ask, 'What'd Yukwon want?'

 

Taeil smirked. He took an Evian water from the fridge. 'Nothing.'

 

'Sure?'

 

Softly, 'Why, Jihoonie?'

 

With a shrug Jihoon collapsed on the couch with his feet hanging off. Everything was so small in Taeil's apartment.

 

After some time, when he figured Taeil was going to stay in the kitchen with his water forever, Jihoon called softly, 'I thought maybe he wanted you back.'

 

'You're drunk.'

 

'No, I— Not anymore.'

 

'He doesn't want me back.'

 

Jihoon peeked over the back of the couch. 'Still feeling depressed about that?'

 

Taeil shrugged, put the water back in the fridge. He staggered over to the couch and rolled gracelessly over the back, flopping—hard—right on top of Jihoon. 'Why do you care.'

 

'I don't.'

 

'Bullshit.'

 

Jihoon squirmed and shoved until he managed to pin Taeil between himself and the back of the sofa; it was uncomfortable but Taeil looked cute, so Jihoon kept him there. He didn't have anything to say, so swallowed and looked away. The TV was off. There was nothing to watch. He watched the ceiling instead.

 

They fell asleep this way and woke curled into each other.

 

*

 

A week later Jihoon sat by the community pool with his feet in the water. It was too cold to swim but it felt nice on his legs at least. He pulled his sunglasses down the bridge of his nose and peered over the top of them, watching as Taeil lit a cigarette and blew smoke rings above their heads.

 

'Don't you get tired of looking at me?,' Taeil whispered, staring at his cigarette. Jihoon took a moment to realize Taeil was speaking to him.

 

Turning away to look at the pool, he shrugged. 'Uh, no.' He pretended his heart hadn't rocketed into his throat when Taeil hooked his chin over his shoulder a moment later. Eyes kept on the water, breathing at a minimum; Jihoon shrugged his shoulder in hopes of throwing Taeil off, but—of course—it didn't work.

 

'What?,' Jihoon said.

 

Taeil didn't say anything, only pressed his mouth to Jihoon's bare shoulder. Then, when Jihoon glanced at him a little annoyed, a little worried, Taeil leaned in and pressed his mouth to Jihoon's own. It was quick, but it was nice; really gentle like the tips of Taeil's fingers. Jihoon melted.

 

And after Taeil moved away, cigarette back in his mouth and his head resting to Jihoon's shoulder, Jihoon sat staring at the backs of his own hands.

 

He asked, 'Did you mean that?'

 

'Only if you did,' Taeil answered.

 


End file.
